The present invention relates to a linear roller bearing. More particularly, the invention relates to a linear roller bearing, including a guide carriage braced longitudinally movably on a guide rail in the axial direction thereof via roller bodies; the guide rail has one bottom face, one top face, and two side faces, which join the bottom face and the top face and on each of which side faces at least one track for roller bodies is located; the guide carriage has two leg parts and one crosspiece joining the two leg parts, so as to embrace the guide rail in essentially a U shape, and at least one roller body race is located in each of the leg parts; and furthermore a roller body race has a load-accepting track, a return track, and curved tracks that join the two tracks, and the load-accepting track of the guide carriage is formed by a raceplate that is parallel to the axial direction of the guide rail and that rests partially on the guide carriage and is braced in rocking fashion about an axis that is approximately perpendicular to the axial direction of the guide rail.
From German Patent Disclosure DE 103 03 948 A1, a linear guide device with a guide rail and a guide carriage movable back and forth on the guide rail in the longitudinal direction thereof is known. A roller body track of the carriage is embodied on a track element that is joined to the guide carriage and that at least on its inlet end has a cantilevered portion, with a length that is at least equal to the diameter of the roller bodies. One disadvantage of this linear guide device is that errors of alignment cannot be compensated for.
From German Utility Model G 90 11 444 U1, a roller bearing is also known which has a main bearing body, guided displaceably on a rail in the axial direction thereof, with one load-transferring row of roller bodies and a return row of roller bodies as well as two rows of curved roller bodies.
In one embodiment of this linear roller bearing, it can be seen that the load-accepting travel grooves of the primary bearing body are located on a raceplate. It can also be seen that the raceplate is curved in convex fashion in the middle portion of its back side, and as a result the raceplate can execute a rocking motion in the complementary groove of the primary bearing body, about an axis that is perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of the rail. By means of this kind of rocking motion, non-planar mounting faces and other errors of alignment can be compensated for, for instance if one and the same higher-order connection part is guided by two primary bearing bodies on one and the same rail, or if one and the same connection part is joined to two primary bearing bodies that are supported on different rails.
This kind of rocking capability based on the convexly curved back side of the raceplate, however, has the consequence in the least favorable case that linear contact exists between the raceplate and the primary bearing body. This linear contact is at the cost of the load-bearing capacity of the linear bearing.
Moreover, the known linear roller bearing has a raceplate of relatively large cross section, which necessitates a relatively large complementary groove in the primary bearing body. Since the groove size is inversely proportional to the rigidity of the linear bearing, narrow limits are set to any increase in the cross section of the raceplate.